1. Technology Field
The present invention generally relates to a file executing method and a file executing system, and more particularly, to a file executing method and a file executing system for executing a computer executable code set stored in a hidden storage area of a storage device.
2. Description of Related Art
Along with the widespread of digital cameras, cell phones, and MP3 in recently years, the consumers' demand to storage media has increased drastically. Flash memory is one of the most adaptable memories for such battery-powered portable products due to its characteristics such as data non-volatility, low power consumption, small volume, and non-mechanical structure. Additionally, portable storage devices have been broadly applied to the storage of digital contents along with the development of plug and play connection interfaces (for example, the universal serial bus (USB)).
A storage device manufacturer usually stores applications in the portable storage devices it manufactured to be used by users which buy these portable storage devices, so as to increase the market competitiveness of these portable storage devices. For example, the manufacturer may develop a disk management program for a portable storage device and stores the disk management program in the portable storage device, so that a user can use this disk management program to manage the portable storage device.
Presently, in order to allow a computer host to execute such an application provided by a storage device manufacturer, the application is stored in a partition (or storage area) for storing data regularly of the portable storage device to be accessed by the computer host. Because an application can be accessed by a computer host in a general file accessing manner, the application can be easily copied and distributed, and accordingly, the intellectual property of a developer of the application cannot be effectively protected. Even though the manufacturer of the portable storage device may allocate a hidden storage area (i.e., a storage area inaccessible to the computer hosts) in the portable storage device and store the application in the hidden storage area to prevent the application from being copied or distributed, since the application has to be executed by the operating system of the computer host, the user cannot use the application stored in the hidden storage area anymore. Thereby, a method for directly executing a computer executable code set stored in a hidden storage area is to be developed.
Nothing herein should be construed as an admission of knowledge in the prior art of any portion of the present invention. Furthermore, citation or identification of any document in this application is not an admission that such document is available as prior art to the present invention, or that any reference forms a part of the common general knowledge in the art.